Using the same numbers for four years, R20 turns into R37m as lotto player wins big
The winner says that he has been playing the lottery since he was 19 years old with his biggest win was previously only R1,200.
Photo: Roxanne Joseph
One lucky Lotto player walked away with more than R37 million in his “pockets” after initially spending only R20 on his ticket from the lotto jackpot during the Wednesday, 29 July 2020 draw.
The national lottery operator announced the self-employed Gauteng-based entrepreneur won a whopping R37,951,526.20.
According to Ithuba, his winning numbers were 06, 16, 23, 26, 33, 48 and bonus number 07.
The unnamed winner told the national lottery operator that the win came as a “big shock and surprise” to him after he played the same numbers for the past four years.
“Since finding out that I won the jackpot, I have not been able to sleep. I have mixed emotions. At some point I am calm, the next I am nervous, I have had a roller coaster of emotions for the last couple of days.
The winner said that he had been playing the lottery since he was 19 years old with his biggest win previously being only R1,200.
“I started playing the lottery when I was 19-years-old and I have always been hopeful that one day I will strike it lucky, but this life-changing win has come as a big shock and surprise to me,” he said.
“I have been playing the same numbers for the past four years, not only for lotto but for PowerBall and daily lotto.
“I wanted to play the quick pick selection because I thought I have been playing the same numbers for years and the maximum amount I have won was R1,200 in the daily lotto draw early this year, so I thought maybe it’s time I changed my playing strategy.
“I asked the cashier for quick pick selection, but before I gave her the money, my gut told me that today might be the day I strike it lucky and opted to play the same numbers manually,” he said.
He said he realised that he had won the jackpot the day after the draw when he logged on to the national lottery social media pages to check the winning numbers.
“I saw that one person had won and wondered who the lucky person might be, and as per usual, I started to dream about what I would do with the money.
“As I was checking the numbers, I realised that these are some of the numbers I usually play, it was only after the fifth number that my heart began racing and I realised I might be the jackpot winner.
“I slept with the ticket under my pillow for two nights and kept on waking up every hour to check if indeed I’m the holder of the lucky jackpot-winning ticket and not dreaming.
“I am not planning on telling any member of my family, including my mother. I’m scared that if I tell her, she might get excited and tell her best friend by mistake and that might cause me unwanted problems and will compromise my safety,” he continued to say.
The winner further told the national lottery operator that he plans on buying a car for his business because it required him to travel around the province to meet his clients.
He also said he wanted to extend his mother’s house to a double-story and erect a tombstone for his late father.
“I will only buy myself a proper house in one of the province’s exclusive housing estates next year because I do not want people to suspect that I am the winner of the lotto jackpot.
“I will invest a small amount towards growing my business and the rest I will invest to make sure me and my mother live a comfortable life for many years to come,” he said.
Ithuba’s head of corporate relations Busisiwe Msizi said the latest jackpot win was only the fourth one in four months.
“We are so excited to have created yet another instant millionaire in a space of four months. Our first major 2020 winner won a massive R135-million PowerBall jackpot in April 2020.
“This was soon followed by the R77-million PowerBall winner from the Tuesday 30 June 2020 draw, and the R15-million lotto plus 1 winner from the Wednesday 1 July 2020 draw.
“The biggest jackpot thus far was won by a player from KwaZulu-Natal who won the biggest Powerball Plus jackpot ever of R153-million in our 10 July draw using their Standard Bank App.
“We promised to offer big jackpots and we are happy that we have been able to offer these big amounts to our players,” said Msizi.
READ NEXT: Lotto and Lotto Plus results, Wednesday, 05 August, 2020
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